A conference in scheduling limbo

September 04, 2006

On Saturday, Mid-American Conference schools play games at Ohio State, at Penn State and a "home" game against Wisconsin in Cleveland. Just another fall Saturday in the MAC -- which might as well stand for Masochistic Athletic Conference. Before conference play begins, MAC schools will spend most of their time on the road, heading off to face schools in BCS conferences for a guaranteed payday and, most of the time, a guaranteed loss. The MAC schools are stuck in scheduling limbo. They're not powerful enough to dictate that power-conference schools come to them or popular enough to sell out every week, yet their athletic budgets are big enough that they need the several hundred thousand dollars that a game at Ohio Stadium or the Big House in Ann Arbor will bring. And without guaranteed revenue that the BCS gives the power conferences that comprise it, MAC schools have to swallow their pride and hope for the occasional upset. "It's a definite revenue booster for the Ohio States of the world, and it's a revenue booster for us because we play them," Bowling Green coach Gregg Brandon said. This year, the Falcons play Wisconsin at Cleveland Browns Stadium -- technically a home game for Bowling Green -- and play at No. 1 Ohio State on Oct. 7. "When you play an Ohio State in midseason, that's probably not real smart," Brandon said. This isn't a new phenomenon. Powerhouse schools have been lining up to hang half a hundred on the McNeese States of the world since the forward pass was invented. But no conference as good as the MAC lines up to take beatings for money quite as gleefully. In 2004, three MAC teams were ranked in the Top 25, and a year later the conference earned a record five bowl bids. And though MAC teams routinely serve as major conference punching bags, there have been some moments of glory, such as the 2003 season when teams from the league upset five ranked opponents. Need further proof of the quality of the MAC? Consider this: Four NFL starting quarterbacks (Charlie Frye, Chad Pennington, Byron Leftwich and Ben Roethlisberger) are from the MAC and this year's conference media guide lists 107 MAC players that were in NFL training camps, including Randy Moss, Minnesota Vikings running back Chester Taylor and former Super Bowl MVP Dwight Smith. Despite all that, the MAC has such a bad rap as a football conference that Florida coach Urban Meyer left Bowling Green because he thought Utah would be a better springboard to a big-time job. He was proven right when the Gators snapped him up after two years in the Rockies. MAC Commissioner Rick Chryst says the league's quality and its willingness to play tough teams does have at least one positive aspect: increased television exposure. And the fact that networks are willing to carry games including MAC teams shows that they are of a certain caliber, he says. "If Northern Illinois has a 23-game losing streak going into that game (at Ohio State Saturday)," Chryst said, "It's not going to make air on national television." Missouri coach Gary Pinkel has seen it from both sides -- he coached at Toledo before jumping to Mizzou, and the Tigers play host to Ohio this year. According to him, the MAC is a victim of its location in the football-crazy Midwest. "You're sitting in Toledo, Ohio," Pinkel said. "Thirty minutes north is Ann Arbor, Michigan; two-and-a-half hours north is Michigan State; two hours west is Notre Dame; two-and-a-half hours south is Ohio State. The whole conference is surrounded by the Big Ten," and other traditional powers. "It's just the law of numbers," Pinkel said. "You can't have two great leagues mixed in with each other." But Chryst is confident that perception of the league is changing. He pointed out that MAC teams play host to four Big 10 schools this year and that the league's number of games that can be considered blatant cash grabs is steadily declining. "I love going to media day and not hearing our coaches talking about how we're a well-kept secret," Chryst said. Meanwhile, Brandon and the other MAC coaches will keep trying to figure out ways to lead their teams into the lion's den and come out relatively unscathed so they can still be competitive in their conference. And he doesn't see any changes on the horizon. "Why is Florida State going to come to Bowling Green?" Brandon asked. "The powers that be would have to make a rule. And I don't see that happening, let me tell you." ___ asap contributor Casey Laughman works in the AP's Columbus, Ohio bureau.